Trumpet virtuoso Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah is stretching modern jazz music to include the flavors of hip-hop, trap and West African percussion. His latest release, Ruler Rebel, is his first in series of three albums marking the 100th anniversary of the first commercially recorded jazz music. As Adjuah tells it, that recording, made by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in New Orleans in 1917, was originally conceived as satire with a racially-charged subtext. It's a history that hits home for Adjuah, who was born and raised in New Orleans' Upper 9th Ward, steeped in Mardi Gras Indian culture.
One and a half million people have seen the Tiny Desk concert that Adjuah performed at NPR's headquarters. If you're not one of them, go check it out — after you listen to this performance and chat, recorded in front of a live audience at World Cafe Live.
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